Abstract
Oxidation of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) is widespread in animal tissues and has been implicated in senescence1 and as a cause of deterioration of stored seeds2. Although signs of lipid oxidation have been detected in seeds during long-term storage3, little is known of the magnitude of the change induced in the PUFA fraction. In conditions of ‘accelerated ageing’ (saturating humidity and 45 °C) in soybean seeds, the PUFA content has been reported to decline within a few days4, but in somewhat milder conditions PUFAs are not oxidized during the time when germinability is lost5. An extreme case in which to estimate the extent to which PUFAs may be oxidized comes from the examination of ancient maize seeds from caves in the southwestern United States, where the arid climate is conducive to the preservation of biological materials6. We have now compared new seeds with seeds which were 1–17 centuries old, and report that most of the linoleic acid (by far the predominant PUFA in this species) is oxidized in the first 100–200 yr, but some is still detectable in seeds more than 1,500 yr old. We believe this represents the oldest sample of PUFA so far reported.
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Priestley, D., Galinat, W. & Leopold, A. Preservation of polyunsaturated fatty acid in ancient Anasazi maize seed. Nature 292, 146–148 (1981). https://doi.org/10.1038/292146a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/292146a0
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